


Will you let me burn in that fire?

by Aikona



Category: Danganronpa, Danganronpa 2, SDR2, Super Danganronpa 2, super danganronpa 2: goodbye despair
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Hinata and Komaeda are in their third year, Initiating Hinata, M/M, No Despair AU, No Kamukura Izuru, No Plot/Plotless, Regular Hope's Peak, Reserve Course - Freeform, Spoilers for Hinata's talent, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, kiss, romantic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-15
Updated: 2018-01-15
Packaged: 2019-03-05 04:16:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13379979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aikona/pseuds/Aikona
Summary: "You're still not telling me what's eating you. Tell me, bluntly,  or I won't figure it out.""You're eating me, Hinata-kun.""... Did youreallyhave to put it like that?"_______________Hinata and Komaeda attempt to enjoy each other's company under the moonlight.





	Will you let me burn in that fire?

"I am completely, undoubtedly, and with my entire heart, disgusted by you, Hinata-kun."

The heavy air lingered languidly, as Hinata knew the delirium caused by Komaeda's tone could not be deterred by anything he said.

The two of them had been sitting outside, right by the fountain that framed the entrance of Hope's Peak Academy. The moon gently lit their cheeks, while quiet flowing sounds of the fountain assured them of peace. However, Komaeda had been in another one of his classic moods that churned and warped despite himself, in such a way that Hinata could not have any form of proper conversation with his classmate to even a minimal degree. He had figured it had been because of some unfathomable worry that had embedded itself deep within Komaeda's consciousness; something that he now believed with every fiber of his being, and was trying to push Hinata as far away from him as possible as a result of his paranoia. 

Hinata had barely looked toward Komaeda after his wild claim. Instead, he blinked as his gaze remained toward the sky. 

"You don't mean that, Komaeda." A flat tone met the grim and huffy laughter emanating by his side. 

"That's ignorant of you, Hinata-kun..." A clear disappointment had given Komaeda a new sense of enlightenment in his words. "Of course-" 

Even before Komaeda finished his thought, Hinata knew what he was going to say. His eyebrows had immediately knit together. 

"-It's to be expected from a talentless Reserve Course student." 

Evidently, Komaeda had gotten what he wanted. Hinata turned to look at him. 

"What are you on about?" He asked, finally. It had been a good handful of weeks since Komaeda had last brought up this same dulled-out topic. 

"Spending your time with me... and, with everyone... don't you feel burnt out? They have such a potential you could never reach! I'd say it's a shame, but it's hard feeling sorry for someone who doesn't understand their place." Komaeda knew he was being stared at with the same eyes that were questioning him of the possibility of being a dumbass since the first day he had said something along similar lines. He knew such words would only rub Hinata the wrong way. 

"I can get up and go right now." There was a sense of concern hidden in the creases of his brow, but it was also hard to pin how much patience Hinata had until he would actually walk away from this. "... Your hand is shaking."

"That!" Komaeda said, as if he was able to figure out what had been bothering him this entire time, holding up their clasped hands. "Don't you find this disgusting, Hinata-kun?"

"..." Hinata looked at their hands as they were lifted, still searching for some kind of reasoning behind this encounter. "... I’m letting go."

Their hands were lowered again. Hinata hadn’t let go.

"I don't understand you, Hinata-kun."

"I can say exactly the same about you."

"I do believe that a part of me hates you, but... I wonder why it's also hard for me to accept. I wonder how it is that everyone loves you, and, in the course of their loving you, I have also come to love you. Whenever you looked at me in disgust, or torment, or confusion... secretly, I would think to myself... 'ah, Hinata-kun looked at me again'. And I would want you to look at me more." 

Hinata's heart squeezed. He ignored it.

"W-what?" It was harder to ignore his own voice when it stuttered. This conversation had been taken to a completely different direction. However, such a sporadic change wasn't uncommon for someone like Komaeda. 

"Hinata-kun, this is disgusting." Komaeda repeated, a somewhat somber edge to his voice. 

"You're holding _my_ hand." Childishly countering, Hinata knew Komaeda wasn't really listening to him. 

"No, Hinata-kun. _You_ are holding _my_ hand." Komaeda paused. For a moment, Hinata thought he might never speak again; the last thing they would have said to each other being two childish remarks that piggybacked onto one another. "My filthy hand... melting with thickened regrets. My hand that even my mother was hesitant to touch… it’s in your hand.” 

"You're still not telling me what's eating you. Tell me, bluntly, or I won't figure it out." 

"You're eating me, Hinata-kun."

"... Did you _really_ have to put it like that?"

"I've had dreams where I'm stuck in a fire in a great big house... and you've been there, on the other side, where the flames haven't reached. You would exit the house, and from the outside you would leave the door open, so you could slowly watch me burn alive and die. Normally, you'd think I would resent the Hinata-kun that left me behind to die, but... whenever I have that dream, I always thought... 'what a relief'. I felt at peace, and I was happy you were the last thing I saw before I died a painful death. I was happy to let you go." 

Hinata gripped Komaeda's hand irritably. 

"However, whenever I wake up... I feel empty. When I realize it was all a dream, I always think: 'it would be better if Hinata abandoned me as eagerly as he did in that dream'." His pale face returning its attention towards Hinata, Komaeda’s gaze almost seemed to be expecting some sort of acceptance towards his words, or some kind of assurance that they were true to Hinata’s intentions.

Hinata, his eyes searching, shifted himself so that he was facing Komaeda properly. 

"Is that what you think of me?" 

Komaeda's eyes glinted, hinting that only self-loathing words would result from that question.

"You're irritating, delusional, and have insanely dismol ideas, but you're gentle. You just want to be appreciated, no matter how adamantly you insist that being hated it fine."

Letting go of their intertwined fingers, Hinata placed a hand on Komaeda's knee. 

"That first night, about a year ago- our second year- when I told you that I wasn't sure if I liked you or not and you told me I was definitely wrong about liking you… somehow, I liked something about you. However, you were always so irritating... and you were always by yourself. You hated that someone as irrelevant as I am was gaining the respect you wish you could receive from your peers without ever daring to ask them for it. When you called me Hinata-kun for the first time, instead of 'you', or that 'Reserve Course student', I thought that I had finally gotten to you. But, you still looked down on me." 

Looking toward the ground, Hinata faltered. It wasn't like him to talk so much. Especially considering he didn't know why he was talking as if desperately trying to clear something up; as if a huge misunderstanding had been created without either them acknowledging it.

"... Then I realized it. What I liked about you." Komaeda's eyes doubted his very resolve. "You wanted to be accepted. You were just like me, even though we're so different. You hated your talent, and I hated my lack of one. However, despite that, the two of us just wanted somewhere we belonged." Hinata's hand moved from Komaeda's knee, and instead to his shoulder. "However, that place..." He paused.

Komaeda was also completely taken aback by the plentiful barrage of words that came spilling from Hinata's mouth. His eyes were wide, and his cheeks were illuminated by a pink tinge that stood barely visible in the moonlight. His lip quivered; perhaps from disbelief or an underlying uneasiness. 

"I-it..." Hinata was losing his drive. "It wasn't necessarily at Hope's Peak." As Komaeda moved to speak, Hinata cupped the side of Komaeda's jaw and placed his thumb over his lips. 

"It wasn't at Hope's Peak." He repeated. "A place where we belonged... maybe it was together." 

The line sunk in. The two of them became flustered in unison, as Hinata quickly removed his hand from Komaeda's face and turned away. 

"H- _Hinata-kun..."_ The huffy voice reached out to him, a gasp for breath followed by the address, something that frequently happened when Komaeda would get too excited. 

Hinata was too embarrassed to look Komaeda in the eye. Two thin hands reached for Hinata’s face, as it was gently lead to face each other again. It was obvious Komaeda was offering Hinata an abundance of opportunities to turn away, as his fingertips had just barely ghosted his skin. 

“Hinata-kun,” If Hinata had 10,000 yen for everytime his name was said daily, “You’re not going to leave me to die in that fire, even if it was my only wish?” 

“No,” The fire had been such a persistent topic; he wondered why. 

“Hinata-kun, you will grow to hate me eventually.” It was almost as if Komaeda was trying to sell Hinata some useless item that was being advertised on TV, and his only marketing line to sell it was ‘the thing you have now is going to get old and stop working soon, so abandon it already’. A singular line, repeated over and over on a choppy record. It made his ears bleed.

“You can’t get more annoying than you are now.”

“We’ll do plenty of disgusting things…”

“... Don’t ever say that again.”

When the hands that barely touched his face began to pull away, Hinata clasped his own around them, as to encourage Komaeda to stay where he was. 

“... Komaeda, you don’t have to be so afraid to touch me.” 

The silence that lasted from his statement caused an immediate conflicting emotion within Hinata; had it been confusion toward the silence, or a regret that he had said it so casually? 

“... I can touch you?” Komaeda’s voice trembled. 

“D-don’t repeat it so vaguely…” It was suddenly uncomfortable to have his own vague statement mirrored back to him.

“C-can I…” Komaeda’s uneven breaths gave Hinata a deep foreboding. 

Leaning forward slightly, Komaeda had immediately paused. Sitting back instead, his arms were now outstretched awkwardly, held in place only by Hinata’s hands around his own. 

Can he? Can he what? That hadn’t told Hinata anything. 

“No… something like that is too much.” 

Too much? 

Suddenly, it clicked. 

“...”

Sighing, he lowered Komaeda’s hands from his face. 

“Komaeda.”

It was evident that Hinata had to be the one to shift closer, as Komaeda had suddenly decided somewhere along the line that this had become a forbidden action. As his face had begun to turn away, Hinata cupped Komaeda’s chin. 

“H-” He started, but Komaeda had cut himself off. Another thought had formulated itself in the middle of whatever his previous statement would have been. “To think pity could reach such a meticulate level!” His dark statement had been shadowed by a cheerful gleam; bright red cheeks and swirling thoughts shook Komaeda’s shoulders. 

Hinata ignored him. 

After a moment, there was a subtle lean forward, as lips met one another. Komaeda’s lips always seemed chapped, but to only assume such a thing was an understatement to the actual sensation of the real thing. Briefly, Hinata compared it to sandpaper. The scratch of sandpaper… it was an odd thing to think about. However, at the hesitant return of his kiss, such a thing didn’t quite matter anymore. 

They had pulled away after a moment, as Hinata’s hand fell from Komaeda’s chin back to his shoulder. Hinata wasn’t really a romantic, in what he perceived romantics to be. He didn’t really view kissing as a thing he wanted to do often, considering it was embarrassing. He wasn’t a really cuddly person, either. He thought cuddling sounded too hot… and the tangle of limbs together didn’t really sound relaxing to him.  
Holding hands in a populated place also wasn’t something he desired. 

However, when the world was quiet, with the sound of water flowing gently as their melody, some things didn’t seem so bad.

The sound of exaggerated breathing brought Hinata back to his senses, as he looked back toward his partner. 

Komaeda, his eyes wide, expression wild, stared blankly. 

“Hinata-kun… let’s do that again.” 

He takes it back. 

“... Wipe off that drool first.”


End file.
